Tag Archive for: Iraq

A Brief Overview of the Shi’a Sects

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Here is the final of three posts on a brief bird’s eye view of the sects within the Muslim faith.  For the Shi’a, it is important to recognize that they have always been somewhat of an underdog to the Sunnis.  That is why a Shi’a movement of considerable note was Isma’ilism, as it gave rise to the major dynasties of the medieval Islamic world , rivaling the Sunni kingdoms for a time.  When Ismai’ilism was overthrown by the famous Sunni leader Saladin, the sect was split into two groups.  Some became Musta’lian, following the caliph Mustansir (now called Bohra)  while others followed his brother Nizar. Today, most Ismail’ilis are Nizaris, whose Imam is known as the Aga Khan.   

An offshoot of the Nizaris became the radical order called Assassins. They were never considered mainstream Muslims in any way.  Instead, this militant extremist group of Ismaili’s (Imams of the Nizari line) radically opposed the Sunni majority (since the 11th c.) and their purpose was to overthrow Sunni leadership.  They would target a single victim and set out alone with only a dagger.  They were called assassin from the word hashishiyya as they were thought to either be under the influence of hasish or simply acting like hasish addicts with bizarre behavior.    

The Druze sect is more or less a secret religious sect located in Lebanon, Syria, Israel, and Jordan.  No one is permitted either to leave or to join their community. 

The Alawis are an extremist sect located mostly in Turkey and Syria.  They are deviant to most other Shi’a sects and all Sunnis.  They are an important minority however as the Asad family, the Syrian presidential “monarchy”, are Alawis.

The most influential of the Shi’a sects currently are the Shi’a Twelvers.  This sect began in 765 CE.  After a succession of 12 generations of Imams after Ali, the 12th Imam disappeared circa 814, leaving no successor. This 12th Imam is known as the “hidden Imam”, a Messianic figure who will return in God’s good time.

Shi’a Twelvers played a significant historical  role in the change in the relationship between Sunni and Shi’a all over the Middle East that remains today.  In the 16th century, (the Safavid dynasty, who were Twelvers) seized power back from the Sunnis and reunified Persia (Iran).  They then reconstituted the ancient empire and resumed the ancient title of Shah, used by the emperors of the pre-Islamic era.  They proclaimed Twelver Shiism to be the state religion of the Iranian realm.   This marked them off from their Sunni neighbors in the Ottoman lands to the west, India in the east, and central Asia in the north resulting in a struggle for control of the border province of Iraq-long contested.      

Since the beginning of Islamic rule, Iran and Iraq are the only countries with Shi’a majorities. Their sense of competition for supremacy in the Middle East, has created a different mind set for authority.  Emerging from the centuries old experience of Sunni dominance and the resulting Shi’a subordination are seen all the social and psychological consequences of this reality. For instance, the Shi’a of Iran in the late 19th century created a new title, the Ayatollah, the supreme guide of the Islamic Republic of Iran, a kind of Pope lite, thereby creating ultimate and sovereign power.

Yet the continuing economic strife in most of the Muslim states, along with the influence of the secular world, and access to a constant stream of information, makes the longevity of enforced religious law and ultimate human authority tenuous at best.      

Quote of the day, from the wisdom of the Lebanese poet Kahlil Gibran in The Prophet:

“And if you would know God be not therefore a solver of riddles. / Rather look about you and you shall see Him playing with your children./And look into space; outstretching His arms in the lightning and descending in rain./You shall see Him smiling in flowers, then rising and waving His hands in trees.

THE POWER OF PLACE

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There is power in place to move us and feed our spirit.

Nature has the perennial power to return us to ourselves and find unity and harmony in nature. Lots of  places are people made places built especially for worship, for prayer and meditation. Houses of worship with their spires, their domes, their minarets.  Inside, there are altars and private corners, to listen, to light a candle, or unload a burden.  Outside, there may be a sanctuary where one can quietly reflect. These are sacred spaces.

There are also the spaces we make for ourselves.  It could be an Adirondack chair we set up purposefully near a shady tree or bird bath.  Writer Sarah Ban Breathnach tells of a “meditation table” she set up in her bedroom.  She gathered items that had meaning for her: “a large golden pillar candle, a Victorian lithograph of an angel, a print of the Madonna and Child, pictures of family and pets, a small blue and white vase for fresh flowers….this encourages me to meditate more often.”

Down the main road from me, there is a man who has been building a cairn for several years now.  A cairn (Gaelic, old Scottish) is essentially a pile of stones, sometimes elaborately stacked with smooth and rounded rocks which act as a land marker or as a memorial.  They often appeared inspired, like sculpture, works of art.  This guy down the road… his is a tower.  I don’t know how he does it.  It’s been climbing upwards for several years now.  It’s like the game where you don’t want to be the last person to knock all the marbles down.  Every time I drive by, I think, “How is he doing it”?

Then I found out what this marker is for.  Each rock stands  for each month our country has been in Iraq and Afghanistan.  He wanted to have some tangible way to show how long it’s been, he is keeping watch and  remembering.  Those stones are both marker and memorial.  This cairn is no longer just a thing of beauty, it reminds me in a haunting way that as I run through my busy day, others are in harm’s way.

Personally, three places come to mind that rarely fail to inspire, heal, and quiet my soul.  The first is the Cape Cod seashore.  There are particular beaches I could mention, but what’s important is the time of day. The early morning and just at dusk, times when the beach is empty or almost so, and I can sit and listen to the promise of each new wave, watch the sandpipers scurry after their infinitesimal food, and become peacefully blurred into the expanse of sea and sky.  As JFK once noted, there is indeed something about the ocean and humans, something about how we are mostly made of water and it may because we all came from it.  I don’t know. I know it’s powerful.

And my antique French pine writing desk with its worn top and soft yellow cabriolet legs holds my sacred menagerie.  There are funky framed  photos of my children (when they were little and sweet!), stacks of favorite, dog eared books, watercolors by my artist daughter, always a brightly colored coffee mug, and a giant jar filled with writing utensils where I have taped a poem by William Henry Channing.  Outside my window is a very old apple tree (now blossoming) and birds of all sorts stop by to delight.

Where are your places?  What is it that moves you about them?  Is is time for you to create your own space?  Or is time to return a place that perhaps is a long overdue visit?

Professor Joseph Campbell (another folk hero of mine) spoke many times about the importance of finding or creating a sacred space: Quote of the Day: “You must have a room or a certain hour of the day or so where you do no know what was in the morning paper…a place where you can simply experience and bring forth what you are, and what you might be…At first you may find nothing’s happening…But if you have a sacred place and use it, take advantage of it, something will happen.”